My Sketchbook’s Gifts to Me

 

Another partially used sketchbook conquered.

My goal to fill partially used sketchbooks continues. My latest conquest is this Hahnemühle Akademie Aquarelle sketchbook. For student grade, it contains excellent paper, but once I discovered Hahnemühle’s watercolor books containing 100 percent cotton paper, especially on location, there was no turning back.

What makes this book unusual is that it is entirely filled with sketches using reference photos and some imaginary work – not a single page drawn from life. I did a lot of portrait practice, both human and animal, direct watercolor challenges, workshop exercises, composition practices – all done from home.

An exercise in imaginative drawing and watercolor play.

The superpower of working on location is that the sketch becomes permanently infused with sensory memories from the experience. When I look back at an urban sketch, especially from my travels and other experiences that were new to me, all the sounds, smells and feelings of making the sketch come rushing back.

This book doesn’t evoke any memories or feelings in that way. Even when I sketch from a photo I’ve taken myself of a place I know well, the superpower of drawing from life doesn’t work. Although seeing a portrait made of an Earthsworld stranger sometimes  makes me recall whatever struggle or satisfaction I may have felt from an approach or medium I was trying, the subject and experience have no other emotional connection.  

Lots of Earthsworld people! I usually crop images neatly for this blog, but here are the full pages, messy scribbles and all.

This volume, however, is emotionally meaningful in a different way. I began using it in March 2023 in the midst of my most difficult, painful caregiving years. Most pages were filled late at night when I could finally take respite to recover from the day’s challenges so that I could sleep. I now see the book as the direct product of the art therapy that probably saved my life (or at least my sanity). Recalling that time, it’s hard to look through now, but I’m also filled with gratitude.

Composition studies using the Caran d'Ache mixed media set

I also appreciate the purely experimental nature exhibited in this book. With no connection to subject matter, I could focus exclusively on media, technique, approach or whatever else I was exploring. With my grounding in urban sketching, I tend to think of my sketchbooks mainly as repository for my on-location observations. The pages are finished products. But to many artists, a sketchbook is a place for play and experimentation. I have sometimes worried that I don’t do enough of that kind of play in my daily-carry sketchbook, but this book makes me realize I have been doing it all along – I just keep the play in a separate volume.

It is always with great satisfaction that I put away a completed sketchbook into my bookcase designated for that purpose, and my urban-sketch-filled books are usually the most rewarding. This one surprised me for all it has given back to me.

I filled the few remaining pages with doomscrolling prevention tactics and my recent Blick themed Neocolor II palette experiments.

A Pink Pick for National Donut Day

 

6/5/26 Top Pot Doughnuts, Wedgwood neighborhood

My dilemma is always the same. When I go to a donut shop with the intention of sketching my treat, what kind do I choose? One of my favorites to eat (fritter [see last year's], Bavarian cream [in 2017], chocolate-glazed raised), none of which are particularly attractive, or a pretty one that I may not enjoy as much but will be more fun to draw? Since it was National Donut Day, which I look forward to observing annually, my sketchbook won the argument with my mouth: A bright pink raspberry-glazed raised ring.

Lots of families came in briefly for after-school treats (kids scarf down donuts surprisingly fast), but most purchases were for takeout. I was lucky to catch one young boy who was there with his dad to celebrate the last day of school.

View from Retreat

 

6/4/26 Green Lake Park

After finishing a couple of errands on foot, I stopped for a Cortado break at Retreat. At the café’s sunny outdoor seating area, I picked this view facing a curve in the road around Green Lake – similar to a composition I had sketched several years ago from the same café.

In that 2022 post, I had been complaining about our Juneuary weather. Other than that one freakish day last week when the temps hit the high 80s, we haven’t had summer yet. I don’t mind cool morning clouds, though, when they eventually give way to blue skies. As long as it’s warm enough to sketch outdoors, I’m happy.

Blue notes: I may have to reconsider this Caran d’Ache Blue (260) for sky (see geeky mutterings in this post). This blue is too reserved for the exuberance I feel when the sky finally appears. I may have to bring back my favorite, much warmer Middle Cobalt Blue (660).

Overlook Landscaping

 

6/7/26 Waterfront Overlook Walk

A cruise ship was in, and soccer fans were already in town for the impending World Cup, which meant only one thing: Pike Place Market was more mobbed than usual on Sunday. Fortunately for USk Seattle, our outing focused on spacious Waterfront Overlook Walk, which feels unoppressive even when lots of people are enjoying this city gem.

After sketching there several times since it opened less than two years ago, what caught my attention this time was how lush all the landscaping has become. Lupine and many small floral bushes were blooming everywhere (which the bees seemed to appreciate). I decided to make the landscaping the “story” of my first Overlook visit of the summer (I anticipate more . . . some of my best-used tax dollars are here).

Blick Urban Sketch Palette (Tina Edition)

 

6/4/26 Blick's Urban Sketch palette (photo reference)

Yesterday I emulated the “Blick Exclusive” edition of Caran d’Ache Neocolor II water-soluble wax pastels with the Botanical and Earth Tones theme. In today’s post, I recreate the Urban Sketch set (of course). As I mentioned yesterday, my Cobalt Blue (160) and Emerald Green (210) have gone missing, and both appear in this palette too, so they are absent in my recreation. I didn’t think Cobalt Blue was necessary since Ultramarine is included, but a green seemed essential, so I subbed in Phthalocyanine Green (710).

While the color range is wide enough for most urban scenes, it’s a bit heavy on browns and other earth tones for my needs, and including both Sepia and Black seems nearly redundant. I use Light Gray (intended for pavement, I suppose?)  so infrequently that I didn’t know what to do with it in my sketch. I ended up using it mostly to block in shapes that I colored over later with other colors. It’s curious that the palette includes Lemon Yellow, Golden Yellow and Orange while the Botanical and Earth Tones set includes only one yellow. (A-ha – the tin illustration shows a classic yellow taxicab.)

Phthalocyanine Green stands in for Emerald in my recreated palette.

With blue and green in the palette, I knew what I needed in my reference photo: Trash cans! Maybe I was influenced by the theme’s name, but I found this palette comfortable and easy to use. I only needed to take artistic license with the car’s color (yellow cabs are extremely rare in these parts). Not seeing an obvious way to use Vermilion and Carmine with this reference photo, I had to start a dumpster fire (ha-ha).

While Phthalocyanine Green is ideal for trash cans, I find it too unnatural for foliage. Using this palette taught me, however, that when warmed with Lemon Yellow, it’s not bad.

As I did with yesterday’s palette, I balked at too many colors being used for no reason – and then I reminded myself that no one said I had to use them all. In any case, I enjoyed using these palettes as a fun exercise in stretching my color vocabulary. It was relaxing, too, because I didn’t have to think about which colors to choose. I’ll add this to my doomscrolling prevention toolkit.

The two themes I emulated are each wide-ranging enough that they could be used as standalone sets. The Blick Exclusive series has two more sets – Fantasy Dreamscape and Floral Expressions. Fantasy Dreamscape is overly heavy on cool hues, and the floral set wouldn’t be adequate for urban scenes, making both less versatile. If I come across reference photos that might be appropriate for those palettes, I might try them someday.

In the meantime, I have a more pressing matter at hand: Where could my Emerald Green and Cobalt Blue be . . .?

Blick Botanical and Earth Tones Palette (Tina Edition)

 

6/3/26 A hot mess of 13 colors (photo reference)

Cruising casually on the Blick site one day (as one does), I came across a series of new products: Caran d’Ache Neocolor II sets with a “Blick Exclusive” label! At first my heart skipped a beat: What?? New Neo II colors that only Blick can sell?? It didn’t take long for my heart rate to return to normal; the colors aren’t new at all. Caran d’Ache has curated four themed palettes for Blick to sell exclusively. The 15 colors in each set are all from Cd’A’s standard Neocolor II line, the sets come in Cd’A’s standard red tins, and Blick’s name is on the sleeves.

It’s an interesting co-marketing play. I know that Blick is widespread in the US, but I wouldn’t have guessed that the art supply store is ubiquitous enough for Cd’A to put the store’s name on one of its bestselling products.

In any case, the most interesting part to me was looking at the colors that had been selected for each theme. I’ve found it to be an intriguing creative exercise to try on a palette that someone else has designed. The first time I tried it was several years ago with the Beya Rebaï Neocolor II sets. More recently, fashion designer Kévin Germanier’s surprising palette of colored pencils inspired me in unexpected ways (which led to my own palette-making discoveries that I’m still applying).

Since I own almost all the Neocolor II colors, I thought it would be fun to recreate a couple of the “Blick exclusive” palettes and try them. Today’s post is my version of the Botanical and Earth Tones palette. A couple of colors are missing here: Cobalt Blue (160) and Emerald Green (210). (I’m sure I own both, as my swatch page includes them, yet both have mysteriously disappeared from my studio. Annoying.) I thought the 13 I had were plenty, though, to make a sketch.

Two colors missing from the palette: Cobalt Blue and Emerald Green

While I do understand that no one is expected to use all the colors in the set in a single work, I gave myself that challenge just for fun. My natural tendency is to minimize my palettes to the extreme, but my recent bingeing of Colin Woodward’s YouTubes and taking his mini-workshop have pushed me to try being more maximalized.

Since the theme is flowers and plants, I dug through my reference photos to find one with lots of both, especially in the colors of the palette. The hot mess shown here is the result. The greens were all familiar to me, as I use them often (one is in my current daily-carry). I found it odd, though, that the set includes two olive-y greens that are so similar. I suppose the light blue was intended for the sky in landscapes, but the photo I chose had none visible, so I tossed it around at will. I didn’t learn much from this palette except that 13 colors were too many for this sketch, and I winced at the lack of palette cohesion. Making the scribbly mess was fun, though.

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s post when I recreate another “Blick exclusive” palette.

Thornton Creek in the Morning

 

6/2/26 Thornton Creek

Temps climbed to the mid-80s on Tuesday – unusual for this early in June (though I suppose it’s becoming the new normal). Getting out early for my walk to beat the heat, I went north to Thornton Creek. A couple of weeks ago when Kim and I had such a good time there, It was late afternoon. In the early morning, different parts of the creek’s plantings were illuminated, so it was like having a whole new landscape to choose from.

I inadvertently mixed this green at Gas Works Park -- a happy accident.

More green notes: A couple of days ago, I noted that my current greens were working well together, but I was still using them mostly conventionally. Then the next day at Gas Works Park, intending to use Inktense Iron Green, I inadvertently grabbed the overly cool Caran d’Ache Dark English Green (729) and mixed it with Spring Green (470) for the hillside foliage. Although the result was surprising, it made an interesting complement to the rusty, reddish gas works. That combo reminded me of the CYMK primary triads I had played with extensively several summers ago.

At Thornton Creek, I decided to use the same pairing for the maple tree’s foliage. The result is a little more edgy than my usual, “safe” mixes – and I like it! Maybe there’s hope for me yet, even if it takes a happy accident (as Bob Ross would say).